Opportunistic fungal infections are responsible for increased morbidity and mortality among patients suffering from AIDS and other immunocompromised diseases including infections resulting from neutropenia, cancer chemotherapy and organ transplantation (Annals N.Y. Acad. Sc., 544:1-3).
Moreover, until recently, the treatment of deep seated fungal infections has lagged behind the treatment of bacterial infections and only a few systemic agents are available for combatting these invasive pathogens.
Current therapy provides for administering polyenes such as amphotericin B, allylamines such as Naftafin and Terbinafin and azoles such as Fluconazole, Itraconazole and Ketoconazole. Amphotericin B, once the treatment of choice, is no longer favored due to the acute and chronic toxicities associated with its use.
Also, antifungal azoles are fungistatic, not fungicidal, and this has resulted in azole resistant fungi, that is, fungi strains and isolates which are resistant to treatment with Fluconazole and other known antifungal agents (New Engl. J. Med., 1944, 330: 263-272.)